Pirelli P Zero Corsa: massive grip

Road Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A, March 2003 - The first sneak preview of the P Zero Corsa took place in static form only in early March at the Geneva Motor Show, the tyre being exclusive original equipment on the new Ferrari Challenge Stradale. Today, the new P Zero faces the test of the track on the asphalt circuit of Road Atlanta, just a few kilometres from the capital city of the American state of Georgia. P Zero Corsa is Pirelli's answer to the demands of special motorists to meet their singularly specific needs: those of sports car owners who also use their motoring masterpieces on the track for sheer driving pleasure and the ability to exploit their fast cars to the full. As is the case with the Ferrari Challenge Stradale, a model born of more than a decade of Pirelli and Ferrari experience in the Ferrari Challenge-Pirelli Trophy race series and on the circuits of the FIA-GT Championship with the Ferrari 360. The technological content of such supersport cars has led to such advanced performance as to require from the vehicle a real "destination of use" that will permit the car and driver to best express themselves on the difficult terrain that is the race track. Here, maximum safety and absolute reliability of the car's components must correspond to driving pleasure: the circuit environment and the supersport driving experience are emotionally unrepeatable elsewhere, so such an experience must be embarked upon with the right preparation and awareness. The correct choice of tyres is part of that circuit driving consciousness, ensuring enjoyment of performance, while remaining within the confines of maximum safety. To meet those special motorists' needs, Pirelli has developed the P Zero Corsa, which is also available as a System option with a directional tread pattern for the front tyres and asymmetric for the rears: a range of road tyres also suitable for use on racing circuits, a further step forward in the "tyre of extreme performance" concept. Born to race, P Zero Corsa is the right choice to ensure a car is always "glued to the asphalt" and gives the driver the certainty of being able to stop his car when and where he or she pleases. The dry is the tyres natural battlefield, where it transfers hundreds of horsepower to the ground and exalts the dynamic qualities of highly sophisticated chassis. A tyre that becomes synonymous on the track with absolute grip, millimetric precision of insertion into a corner, of fast and accurate response at the steering wheel, of constant trajectory. Behind the qualities of the P Zero Corsa is the last word in the tyre production process, which has meant, first of all, the achievement of great tensional equilibrium of its components. That has permitted the design of a tread profile, which optimises the structural synergies between the belt and the nylon cincture. The advantages: stable performance, a more precise drive, more even wear. The shape and dimensions of the tyre's footprint on the ground is always guaranteed absolute reliability in any driving situation. And the P Zero Corsa's print is extraordinarily wide, the direct effect of a high flexibility steel belt, which uses innovative materials able to contain weight while increasing resistance to tension. Another element of fundamental importance in the development process of the P Zero Corsa was its tread compound. Driven to the limit, the tyre reaches a high operating temperature: in such conditions, the quality of the tread mix obviously becomes determinate. The Pirelli P Zero Corsa has adopted an innovative compound of high hysteretic value, able to adapt the tyres grip to the thermal conditions in which it is operating and, above all, work in the best possible way with its structural rigidity. Wet or dry asphalt, cornering on the limit, high speed on the straight, cadence braking are no longer a problem: adhesion and safety are guaranteed. The tread pattern of the P Zero Corsa is an ingenious combination of transverse "waves" which, at the same time, also follow directional progress - when playing out its anti-aquaplaning role, but also when supporting acceleration on the straight - and are combined with an asymmetric geometry that progressively moves the flow of waves towards the inner area of the tread. The asymmetric concept provides an outer shoulder area that is almost a racing slick, so as to guarantee maximum adhesion, especially when cornering on the limit, while the directional grooves in the centre and inner area of the tread combat aquaplaning and also improve driving capability in the wet: a mix of characteristics that brings maximum performance in all environmental conditions. The working of the P Zero Corsa's belt materials, lightness of the carcass, wide and regular footprint area, highly hysteretic compound, directional and asymmetric tread patterns at the same time: these are the characteristics that contribute to increasing the tyre's level of adhesion in sports driving, especially when fitted to bigger diameter rims. Composed in this way, the wheel group better contains the centrifugal deformation caused by high speed and improves performance in the footprint zone, due to the greater surface area in contact with the road or track. P Zero Corsa System: style takes to the race circuit Starting with the P Zero Corsa project, Pirelli then went on to create the P Zero Corsa System option in the purest conceptional style which, right from the start, has accompanied the story of the P Zero brand, an ultra-high performance tyre range that has become a point of reference for car manufacturers throughout the world. The System's two different tread patterns have been developed in collaboration with car maker partners who are absolute technological leaders in the high performance sector, to equip in optimum fashion the best of the supersport cars with central or rear traction and extra-large section wheels. P Zero System was born of a considerable technological effort, aimed at exalting the global reliability of the car in the presence of exceptionally powerful engines and components, derived from racing experience. Beyond the P Zero Corsa System, which takes the overall Pirelli P Zero project to its extreme limit, there are only racing tyres. Extreme in its performance characteristics, the P Zero Corsa System Asymmetric comes from a technologically evolved project that has led to a reduction in weight and an increased resistance to stress at the same time. Its footprint is large, rendering the pressure in the support area both regular and uniform, the merit of the tyre's structure, which uses special innovative materials, able to equilibrate rigidity and flexibility in varying conditions of use. In the dry, the asymmetric tread pattern dispenses a progressiveness of acceleration to the different functions of cornering adhesion, while in the wet it provides a quick expulsion of water, in line with the great tradition of Pirelli asymmetrics. The P Zero Corsa System Directional was designed to guarantee maximum sports car driving safety in both the wet and dry. Aggressive when confronted with the danger of aquaplaning, the tread pattern of the P Zero Corsa Directional generates a continuous and effective mechanism for water expulsion in the footprint area, so that the tyres are in constant contact with the road or track surface, to the advantage of steering control and overall command of the vehicle. In extreme use on the track or in road transfers, the project quality of the Corsa System - absolute grip when cornering, accelerating and braking - are more than evident. But even more stupefying is the effectiveness of this ultra-high performer on wet asphalt, where the limit normally imposed by water on wide front tyres is practically annulled: the Directional prepares the surface with its effective lateral expulsion of water, so that the Asymmetric can express its characteristic qualities of roadholding. Driver safety is guaranteed.